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MAPPING CRIME IN EAST AFRICA AND ITS IMPACT ON DEMOCRATIZATION. BY TOM M. OCHOLLA. Introduction.
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MAPPING CRIME IN EAST AFRICA AND ITS IMPACT ON DEMOCRATIZATION BY TOM M. OCHOLLA
Introduction • Criminal activity has been, and continues to be, a major concern in many countries world over. Indeed the existence of the crime is as old as the creation of man itself and man has always endeavored to look for ways and means of dealing with crime so as to minimize its harmful effects. Criminal activities such as thefts, assaults, homicide, etc. take place everyday in all parts of the world, Africa included . • To be able to effectively deal with crime, proper mechanisms have to be put in place to discover or show the shape and arrangement of crime. • However, any endeavor to discover crime and understand its costs and implications is not a very easy task. This is due to the fact that successful crime is secret crime and inherently difficult to measure. Moreover, many crimes go unreported either because many citizens are disillusioned and do not believe any action will be taken by the police or fear reprisals. Indeed even when crimes are reported, corruption and poor record keeping makes it difficult for all of them to be dealt with satisfactorily.
In a nutshell, even though it is possible to gather data about the basic scope, trends and contours of crime, the specific numbers will most probably be imprecise. • In studying crime, one issue that is rarely considered and yet very important is the nexus between crime and democratization. This about the effects of crime on a democratic culture . • This paper therefore looks at the question of Mapping Crime in East Africa and its Impact on Democratization.
Categories of crime in East Africa To be able to map crime it is important to understand what it means and its different categories. • A crime a wrong committed against the state. In the Penal Code (Kenya),for example, crimes are divided into various categories: a) Offenses Against the Person. These are usually serious offences and include murder, manslaughter, suicide, concealing death, doing an act intended to cause grievous harm, kidnapping and assaults . b) Offenses Against Property. These include stealing, robbery, burglary, receiving stolen property, arson, and destructing of property. c) Offenses Against Public Order.Examples of these crimes are treasonable felony, inciting to mutiny, aiding a prisoner of war to escape, printing prohibited publications and being at, and consenting to, the administration of an oath. d) Offenses Against Administration of Lawful Authority. These include obstructing officers of court, impersonating a person in public service, tampering with public officers,fabricating or destroying evidence, giving false information to a person in a public office, undermining the authority of a public officer, and destruction of statutory documents
Others include fraud or breach of trust by a person in public service, neglect of duty and disobedience of lawful order. e) Offenses of Injurious to the Public in General. These include: (i) Offenses Against Religion such as insult to religion, disturbances of religious assembly and writing of words with intent to wound religious feelings. (ii) Offense Against Morality such as rape, abduction, defilement of a girl under 14 years, living on earnings of prostitution, attempt to procure abortion and attempt to and commission of unnatural offenses, and incest. (iii) Offenses Relating to Marriage and Domestic Obligations such as bigamy, fraudulent pretence of marriage, dishonesty or fraudulently going through a ceremony of marriage ,child stealing, and a master failing to provide for his servant. (iv) Nuisances and Offense Against Health and Conveniences. These include being an idle or disorderly person, wearing uniformwithout authority , doing an act likely to spread an infection or dangerous disease, committing common nuisance, printing or publishing advertisement relating to lottery, and adulteration of food or drink intended for sale. f) Defamation. Under this libel is the best known offense.
Causes of crime in East Africa Mapping crime also requires an understanding of causes of crimes. In East Africa, like in other regions of the developing world, causes of crime are quite adverse and they include: • Population explosion i.e. when population grows so rapidly such that there are large numbers of people who have to compete for scarce resources • Economic inequality and deprivation • Inadequate government services • Lack of capacity by law enforcement agencies . • Unemployment • Socio political conditions e.g. political competitions which leads to violence in times of elections and other political activities
The Role of Geography in Determining Where People Commitcrimes • Generally speaking , the distribution of crime is geographically random due to the fact that crimes are human phenomena. In order for crimes to take place, the criminals and their victims or targets (people or property) must be present at the same location. • Factors such as the lure of the potential targets and simple geographical convenience for an offender influence where people choose to commit crime. It can therefore be argued that geography plays a crucial role in determining commission of crime and this factor can provide important clues for law enforcement and ensuring criminal justice . • N. B. It should be noted, however, that in East Africa, just like in other regions of the world , major urban centers have a higher concentration of criminal activities than rural areas .Crime rates in cities such as Nairobi, Mombasa, Dar es salaam, Kigali, Kampala, and Bujumbura are generally higher than those areas that are predominantly rural.
Identifying crimes in East Africa • Mapping crime also entails identifying the types of crimes committed, the trends in crime, the geographical location of crimes, the modalities for reporting crimes and the identity of the criminals including their gender. • In East Africa most cases of recorded crimes are those that are reported to police stations and other authorities dealing with particular aspects of crime such as Anti corruption commissions. • A look at records of these agencies over the years reveals various facts and trends in crimes.
Number of Crimes Reported to Police Stations In Kenya, for example, the crimes reported to police stations from 2004-2008 include homicide, offences against morality, other offences against persons, robbery, breakings, theft of stock, stealing, theft by servant, handling dangerous drugs, vehicle and other thefts, traffics offences, economic crimes, corruption, offences involving police officers , offences involving tourists and other penal code offences.
Table 1:Number of crimes reported to police stations 2004-2008
It is evident from Table 1 above that there was a general down turn in reported crimes between 2004 and 2008, except in 2008 when there was a marginal increase to 63,476 from 63,028 cases in 2007. • Of the different categories of crime, it is the stock theft that had the remarkable increase from 2007-2008(i.e. from 1,568 to 2,269 cases) these figures are however not reflected in the Table 1 above.
Crime reported to police by Provinces Crime reported to police by provinces is important in showing geographical distribution of criminal activity. • Crimes reported generally declined from 2004-200, but increased between 2007 and 2008 in all provinces except in Nairobi and the Kenya Airport Police Unit (See Table 2 below). • This general increase may be partly attributed to the post 2007 election violence.
Number of offences reported to police by provinces 2004-2008Number
Gender and Crime • It is also important to categorize crimes in terms of gender of the offenders. • In Kenya, for example, male criminals have constituted over 80% of all the crimes reported to the police since 2005. However, there has been a general reduction in reported cases of male offenders. Similarly, cases of female offenders have shown general decline since 2005(See Table 3 below)
Table 2:Number of Persons Reported to Police to have Committed Offenses by Gender 2004-2008 Source : Economic survey ,2009.
Age and crime • In mapping crime, it is important to understand the relationship between age and the offenses committed. In Kenya, for example, between 2004 and 2008 persons below 16 years old committed the least number of offenses, while persons falling within the age bracket 26-50 years committed the most crimes from 2005 to 2008.( See Table 4 below). Source: Economic Survey,2009.
Crime and democratization • Democratization may be defined as the way democratic norms, institution and practices evolve and are disseminated both within and across the national boundaries. • It is the transition to a more democratic political regime. It may be the transition from the an authoritarian regime to a full democracy or transition from a semi-authoritarian political system to a democratic political system. Thus to be democratic a country must choose its leaders through fair and competitive elections, ensure basic rights and civil liberties and respect the rule of law.Crime impacts on democratization in that it leads to the delegitimization of institutions and this is manifested in the following: • High rates of crime undercut faith in democratic institutions. This is because the institutions responsible for controlling crime and administering justice such as the police, courts, and prisons get discredited .
Citizens who have fallen victims of criminal acts get disillusioned with the performance of government institutions in protecting peoples rights , freedoms and welfare. Such people are less likely to report crimes to police because they feel it is a waste of time to do so. • The lack of confidence in the courts and police may prompt people to resort to quick-fix solutions that undercut democratic norms e.g.. mob justice that entails public beatings and lynching which are common practices in Kenya and other East African Countries. This limits the chances of due process being followed to protect the rights of accused persons. • Crime also hampers democratization by eroding state authority and blurring the line between the state and civil society.- This is due to the fact that the government loses its monopoly of the use of legitimate means of force. This is demonstrated by the proliferation of private security firms that have become a common feature in East African states. - This ‘privatization of justice’ blurs the boundaries separating the functions of the state and the private sector. - When citizens are convinced that courts and the police can not effectively deal with criminals, they begin to take the law in to their own hands, arming themselves as a way of protecting themselves.
Conclusion • In this paper we have looked the issue of mapping crime in East Africa and its impact on democratization. We have urged that discovering or showing the exact shape and arrangement of crime is often a difficult task partly because some crime go unreported. • However, crime has remained a matter of concern in East African countries and a number of crimes have continued being committed in this counties. • It has also been argued in this paper that crime does impact on democratization in the sense that it erodes the confidence that people have on legitimate government institutions and some times are forced to take the law in their own hands such as the resort to mob justice, among other things.
